How different flood types impact flood risk

3_Blog_JBA-eBook-1Guest author and SpatialKey data partner, JBA Risk Management, explains how flood data and mapping innovations can help insurers succeed in the U.S. private flood insurance market.  

In order for insurers to most effectively understand flood risk, they must have access to data that provides a full picture of the hazard, including the different flood types that might affect a property: fluvial, pluvial, and storm surge. Although it may seem that flood is just flood, it’s important to understand the different flood types due to the various impacts each flood type can have on a property, and thus different levels of damage.

Fluvial, pluvial, and storm surge: Why it matters


These different flood types have different impacts on a property, and thus can change an insurer’s perspective on a risk. For example, storm surge flooding is extremely damaging due to the salinity of the water, while pluvial flooding is typically cleaner and quick to recede, and therefore likely to result in lower-cost insurance claims.


Use case: Jacksonville, Florida

The need to understand all the drivers of flood can be illustrated using a residential property on 2nd Avenue, Jacksonville, Florida. Jacksonville is one of the five most vulnerable cities to hurricanes on the U.S. east coast and a city at high risk from flooding, experiencing widespread storm surges and flooding during hurricanes Irma and Matthew.

The residential property shown in Figure 1 (below) originally fell into a FEMA Zone X (designated as minimal flood risk). 

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Figure 1: This residential property originally fell into FEMA Zone X (minimal flood risk). Contains data from the FEMA National Flood Hazard Layer.


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Figure 2: JBA’s flood map identifies this residential property as at risk to both fluvial and storm surge flooding.

The complex interplay between flood types

This is particularly damaging for hurricane-prone areas like Jacksonville, where storm surges often coincide with inland flooding. It’s important to represent this complex interplay during the mapping process instead of tackling each flood type separately. JBA’s storm surge mapping has been developed in partnership with leading hurricane modelers Applied Research Associates, ensuring that hurricane activity is fully accounted for in JBA’s flood maps. Additionally, surge data has been used to modify JBA’s inland flood mapping process to reflect the fact that, during a hurricane, rivers can’t flow out to sea as they can in normal conditions. Flood waters then back up, further exacerbating fluvial flooding. For insurers to obtain a complete understanding of the hazard, flood maps must fully represent this relationship. 


It’s clear that having a view of the different drivers of flood risk is vital for effectively understanding and underwriting the risk, especially in hurricane-prone areas where hurricanes can be a major source of flood-driven losses. 

Don’t miss our storm surge use case next week where we’ll apply the importance of flood severities and frequencies.

Check out this eBook to learn how recent advancements in flood data and analytics are helping insurers gain renewed confidence in their U.S. flood risk assessment and selection: 

Download the eBook: Innovations in US flood mapping

Helen Smith holds a bachelor's degree in Geography, specializing in fluvial processes and geomorphology. She leads JBA’s Global Flood Mapping team, which is responsible for developing flood maps for every country in the world. Following the successful release of JBA's 5m Florida Flood Map, Helen is now focused on completing high-resolution 5m flood maps for the contiguous U.S. 

Topics: flood data, Flood risk, private flood

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